The need tier assistance during an emergency situation is a real issue of concern in today's day and age, especially for individuals who may not be able to protect themselves in an adverse situation. In certain countries like the United States of America, a source of help in the event of an emergency is facilitated by the “911” telephone system, which connects the caller to an operator who is trained to identify a number of emergency situations and has access to communication equipment to contact the police, ambulance, fire department and the like to direct external assistance in case of an emergency. Similar facilities are available in other countries as well; however, in countries like India, such facilities are yet to be implemented or may not be feasible given the lack of adequate infrastructure development. Accordingly, in India, and other countries in South Asia and Africa, a person facing an emergency situation and in need of medical or security assistance has to resort to the more conventional ways of defending himself; screaming for help or combating a situation with no assistance. In certain instances, although third parties may be willing and able to provide assistance, many situations are not responded to in a timely manner, or at all, because the individual in need of assistance is unable to get to a telephone and/or cannot reach others for help.
In still other cases, contacting a third party using a telephone (wireless or otherwise) may not be feasible given that the situation at hand may be hostile. Therefore, manually making a phone call, taking a picture, and/or a video can be prevented by a perpetrator because it will be obvious what the potential victim is doing or attempting to do. This can, additionally, escalate the situation and may even put the potential victim in grave danger. Furthermore, even if the potential victim is able to initiate a call via a wireless device, if he/she is unable to communicate the location where the incident is taking place, then diverting help to the potential victim can be very difficult, if not impossible, due to the uncertainty in determining the crisis location.
Some technology is available that is useful for provisioning for emergency services. For example, newer wireless devices are equipped with hardware/software to determine their locations using Global Positioning Services (GPS) and/or other positioning technologies. Some software based applications have been implemented to accurately determine the geo-location of the wireless device. In other instances, applications have been developed that will initiate a call and/or send a message to a selected list of individuals specifically identified by the potential victim. For example, in India, mobile based applications such as ‘Vithu’ have been introduced, which is intended to aid women during an emergency. The application sends an SOS message to previously identified people listed in the application who will be contacted when the user clicks the power button twice indicating an unsafe situation. However, such applications and technologies cannot guarantee that all users will be reachable and more importantly, such applications do not account for the distance that is present between the potential victim pre-identified helpers, thereby greatly reducing the effectiveness of available solutions.
Thus, existing methods and systems do not have the ability to contact known individuals in the immediate area around the potential victim. Moreover, existing methods and systems do not have the ability to contact the general public or emergency service professionals who may be able to provide assistance and are in the immediate area around the potential victim. Accordingly, there is a need for achieving personal security through a panic alert notification method and system which calculates the geo-location of a potential victim or a distressed user; identifies a first level of secondary users who are known to the distressed user and are in the vicinity; identifies a second level of secondary users who may or may not be known to the distressed user and are in the vicinity of the distressed user; and subsequently communicates a panic alert to the first and second level of secondary users by transmitting information relating to the emergency and the location of the incident.